We Are Illuminated
by beezyland
Summary: When Hal asks Margaret if she has some pointers he doesn't actually expect her to. The way she gets behind him to show him is even more unexpected, but the biggest surprise of them all is how it changes everything he thinks of her. Hal/Margaret


Disclaimer: I don't own anything. Just sayin' to say it.

Spoilers: All season 1.

A/N: So I walked into the room and my brother was watching this show about aliens and I was like 'well, that's stupid' and he kept watching it and I kept watching it with him and somehow I ended up writing this. I don't know if I got the characters right, but it's my first (and maybe last) FS fic so let me know what you think.

* * *

><p><strong>-XX-<strong>

**We Are Illuminated**

When he asks her if she has some pointers he doesn't actually expect her to.

Margaret is a mystery. The girl with the tattoos, always, _always_ with a gun strapped to her like a security blanket or an extension of her, an extra arm of sorts. Hal suspects she sleeps with one eye open and one hand on the safety. She does everything with an edge and she's good at everything she touches. Hal wonders how and why, but he never asks.

She gets behind him and Hal tenses. It's become a natural response to everyone who isn't family or Karen. No. He can't think of her. Grief only gets in the way. It has no business present in times of war. He just needs to stay focused. Target practice. Right. Margaret right behind him. Okay.

Margaret slides her foot between his two, kicking at his ankles, trying to get his footing right. She can probably feel how tense he is and that's probably not doing anything for his shooting. She has one hand on his waist and the other on his rib case, looking at his face from over his shoulder. He feels a sudden stirring, hyperaware of how close their bodies are and the heat between. Hal does his best to fight it down, to play cool. After all, his dad is watching.

"Feel that?" she asks in her smooth, silky voice. For a split second he tenses again, thinking she's reading his mind, but then again, it probably has something to do with the stance she's showing him. He gives her a quick _mhmm_ in reply, afraid trying to speak actual words would give him away completely.

Hal's attention returns to the crossbow in his arms and the target in front of him, ignoring how her hand moves from his waist to cup his hand right under the bow. He keeps his eyes forward, trying to ignore her presence and his dad's stare burning into them, questioning and wondering but never asking. Maybe that's where Hal gets it.

Margaret giving him instructions about the trigger and the kick and he's trying damn hard to pay attention even though his mind wanders to how different it feels when her hands are on him oppose to when she lets go. Hal tugs on the trigger, needing this silent burning agony to end. He isn't the least bit surprised when the arrow sails straight past the target—not even close.

"Here's another idea…make sure you're close."

Again with the mindreading. After that moment he starts looking at her differently.

**-XX-**

This is ridiculous. He can't _like_ Margaret.

A time like this there's no room for complicated love triangles with a girl who was carried off by aliens probably doing God-knows-what to her, a girl who is the definition of guarded and has been through enough to stifle her trust in the opposite sex from now until eternity and him, the hero's son, jock gone soldier.

Margaret is just like one of the guys, another fighter. Hal remember how they met, how he basically got his ass handed to him and by her. She had been the enemy then, but even then there had been something between them. He could feel it radiating off of her, how she wanted out of that situation with Pope and his guys almost (if not more) than their group. It didn't surprise him when she joined them. It does surprise him smitten he is.

Smitten, really? No. He can't. He just misses Karen. That's all. And Margaret is blonde like Karen so…

No. To say that the two girls are anything alike couldn't be further from the truth. Karen is sweet and he loved how even with everything going on, there was still something so innocent and optimistic about her. She gave him hope. Margaret it seems has lost everything innocent about her and not by choice. Still, there's something about her that challenges him, makes him want to be better. She takes the world on and treats every moment like she's clawing her way out of hell by hand and would do whatever it takes to survive.

Hal truly, desperately misses Karen, but there's a part of him that finds Margaret so intriguing.

There's something about the way she looks at him. They're about to infiltrate the hospital to rescue Ben and him and his dad have a quick heart-to-heart. With the dead harness riding his back, Hal goes to sneak around the front of the car where Margret is crouched. Their eyes meet and her face is blank like so many he's seen at the impromptu funerals they've had since all this began. Staring for a moment longer, he sees more. Her face may be blank, but her eyes are ablaze.

_Fight till the death. _

He gives her a nod. Message received.

**-XX-**

"I had cancer…when I was sixteen."

She talks about it like it was so long ago, another lifetime maybe, not just a few years back. Hal doesn't know how old she is exactly and he suspects if he doesn't know then no one else does either. Margaret isn't the type that answers the basic questions. _How old are you? What's your last name? What part of Massachusetts are you from_? It just reminds him that if she can't answer the easy ones she'll never answer the hard ones. _What happened to your family? Did you have a family? What did Pope do to you? _

Instead, she brings up cancer. BAM! Interrogation over.

Bringing up the drug dealers and the nurses, teasing her about being popular, Hal never expected _that_. The smile on his face visible fades, the corners of his mouth dropping until he's just dumbly staring at her. She connects the dots for him and tries to joke, but he hears the way her voice drops at the mention of chemo. He wants to reach out to her and maybe she really is telepathic or maybe it shows on his face because she moves away from the wall she's leaning against as if eager to get away, knowing she's said too much.

"I'm glad you made it," Hal breathes. Respect in his eyes.

He wonders why she told him of all people. Knowing Margaret or from what he knows of her (or what he thought he knew about Margaret), she isn't into talking about feelings or her life or her past. So why did she share this, something so personal with the guy who plays lacrosse? He wants to ask her, but she gives him this sort of half-laugh and flips her hood up over her head as she walks off without another word.

**-XX-**

It's been days since Hal watches his dad take off for the city, left with the task of keeping his brothers safe. Tom is yet to return and everything in his gut tells Hal something isn't right, but he has no clue what to do about it. Hal had been devastated when Weaver came back with news about Tom going off with the enemy, a sacrificial lamb. They were supposed to be out of the school by now, but with what happened, Weaver and the fighters are taking some time to regroup.

"Any sigh of him?" Margaret comes up over to him. Hal sits atop an abandoned broken down car. It has the best view over the barricade right outside the school. It's a cool, dark night and the full room is bright in the cloudless sky. It leaves little place to hide.

Though it kills him to reply, Hal whispers, "No."

He feels her stare and if he'd look at her, Hal is certain it'd be something like concern in her eyes even though she'd never own up to it and he wouldn't mention it anyways.

"Hal, it's been days," Margaret says, a cruel finality to her voice. "You haven't been eating or sleeping. You just sit here. Come inside and eat something already."

When he finally looks at her it's with a sarcastic smile. "Is that an order?"

She looks annoyed, like she's dealing with a child. Hal is not a child. Not anymore.

"Fine. You can starve to death for all I care. Good. More provisions for the rest of us," she says coolly. Her rifle is slung across her chest as usual, arms crossed, sending him a pointed look. Hal refuses to play along, leans back on his palms and stares down the street. He expects her to walk away like she always does, surrounded in her air of mystery. Instead, she climbs the car and sits beside him.

"What are you doing?" he asks.

"I didn't think I needed an invitation. Last I checked it was a free post-Apocalyptic country," she replies, pushing her jacket off and only wearing a gray tank top beneath, showing off the ink on her milky arms. Sometimes he has to remind himself not to stare too long at her tattoos even though he suspects they're the key to who the real Margaret is. "Nice night."

"I guess…"

"So you play lacrosse," she says, really making an effort. He can't understand why she's even bothering to try. "That's the one with the sticks, right?"

A smile tugs at his lips. He can't help it. "Yes. The one with the sticks."

She laughs at herself and Hal can't help, but admire the sound. Laughter is nice. Times like these it's the little things that really matter. "Sorry," Margaret says. "I've never been a sports person."

"Really?" he says sarcastically, finally looking her way. "Because you really strike me as a rah-rah school spirit type."

"I know. I can give off that impression," she plays along, "but it's wrong. Let's just say, if we went to high school together I wouldn't have even been on your radar. You would have been busy on the field, scoring goals and chasing cheerleaders or whatever and, well, I'd be smoking pot under the bleachers. Not that it matters. I dropped out when I found out…"

He doesn't know what comes over him, but the next thing he knows, his hand is covering hers in the marginal space between them. "I would have noticed you," he says.

Margaret squirms beneath his soul-searching gaze and pulls her hand out from under his, keeping her eyes on the empty street and the abandoned houses and the trees in the distance. Everything seems to be in sharp focus thanks to the unnaturally bright, natural light of the moon. Hal sees it on her illuminated face. He made her nervous just then. He can't tell if that's a bad type of horrible flashback-inducing nervousness or like the stirring that made him completely miss his target during the practice where all of this began.

Margaret clears her throat. "I came out here because your brothers are worried about you," she says. Keep it about business. Don't lose control of it. Don't let things get too personal. Hal suspects she has a list of rules to live and die by and those are just a few. When there's no chance she'll look back at him, Hal sighs and turns his attention beyond the barricade.

"My dad isn't dead," Hal says bluntly.

"No one thinks he is," she assures him. "Listen, I get that your family is close and I get why you're out here, waiting like this. If I had someone who cared about me like that, I'd be waiting too, but your dad left you in charge of your brothers and the best way to take care of them is to take care of yourself first."

Hal tries to remember the last time he even spoke to either of his brothers. He thinks maybe Ben expressed his worries while Matt stood there like a deer in headlights. Just like his dad told him, Hal's stubborn. When he wants something he's resilient and he wants his dad back so it's what consumed his thoughts. Now here's Margaret, looking him in the eyes, trying to get him to snap out of it. Her eyes scream: _pull yourself together_ and suddenly he realizes he has to.

Hal breaks their stare first. Too intense. The pull. The heat. He'd be so bold as to ask her if she feels it too if only they were in a different universe, a different time. Right now the reality of the situation is that his dad is missing. Karen has been missing. The civilians are caught between celebration and morning. Weaver is stressing to find a next step. So he does the responsible thing, he lets it go and concentrates on what he needs to. He's a fighter before a hormonal teenager and he's a brother above all else.

Looking down, Hal chuckles. "What? Tired of looking out for those two for me? I know they can be a handful…"

Margaret smiles triumphantly, knowing she's gotten through to him. "Oh, it's like you're reading my mind."

Hal gives her a smile, part gratitude, but also because something about seeing her smile makes him want to do the same. He then hops the side of the car, landing on his feet. Scratching his fingers through his standing, dark hair, Hal says, "Come on. I'm hungry."

He holds his hand out and is surprised when she takes it, letting him help her down. "It's late," she reminds him. "The kitchen's closed."

"Well then, I guess we're going to need to be stealth about it." Right when he says it, this smile lights up her face, almost childlike, the closes to innocent she can grasp. He only sees it for a second though because the next she's tilting her chin down and letting her hair fall in her face.

"Let's get a move on it, jock," she says, walking ahead of him.

Hal checks the street one last time before following Margret inside. When he's sneaking down the halls like when he was a kid and would pretend he was a spy, Margaret looks at him like he's an idiot, but then she gets into it, joining Hal as they quietly make their way around the school with matching smiles and light feet. The gun always at her side is forgotten and his lookout point atop the car is empty if only for this moment. Hal can't remember the last time he's felt so good, so much like a kid again, and for Margret, he suspects it's been even longer.

He doesn't know what he feels for her and if she feels it too or if it's all in his head. It's not like he's a normal boy who likes a normal girl. That isn't their story. Maybe in an alternate reality where aliens didn't invade the planet and he was still a simple lacrosse player and she was a cancer survivor back in high school, then maybe things could be different. But that isn't true. They have to work with the hand they've been dealt and as they're rummaging through the kitchen, Hal decides as long as she's on his side, at his side, for now that's good enough.

* * *

><p><span>AN: How was it? Reviews are greatly appreciated. Tell me if I should write another or stop embarrassing myself by trying to write this fandom. Thanks for reading!

xoxo


End file.
